


Gnawing Away the Thrones

by voleuse



Category: Queen's Thief - Megan Whalen Turner
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-25
Updated: 2012-12-25
Packaged: 2017-11-22 08:13:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/607713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voleuse/pseuds/voleuse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>Here's to the seeming accident when all is planned and working</em>.<br/>Marriage demands its own politics.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gnawing Away the Thrones

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lsellers (Annariel)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Annariel/gifts).



> Set after the second book. Title and summary adapted from Vachel Lindsay's _Here's to the Mice!_

Irene opened her eyes. She stood, barefoot but wreathed in her robes, on the roof of the palace. The moonlight beat down, shining cool, and before her, the goddess Moira smiled.

Holy terror roiled in Irene's belly, then a surge of rage. Finally, though, she sighed. "What would you have of me?" She quelled the urge to fold her arms, though the compulsion was strong.

The cloth of Moira's garment shimmered as she shifted forward. "So reluctant?" She tilted her head. "Most offer the gods their gratitude."

"Most are not nudged through their lives like pieces in a game," Irene replied. 

"Queens and kings are granted much privilege and few choices," Moira said. "But you knew that well and long ago."

Irene lifted her right hand, palm up. "I did not realize the construction would be so apparent." She curled her fingers into a fist.

Moira's gaze lingered on Irene's hand. "We remember the sacrifices you both have made."

"You demanded them," Irene retorted. "So I ask again: what would you have of me?"

"Attolia," Moira said, her voice resounding loud. "I would have you wake."

And again, Irene opened her eyes, and it was night, and Gen mumbled, sleeping, beside her.

*

Breakfast was an intimate ritual, between Irene, Gen, and the six servants tradition dictated as necessary. Two to bear the small platters back and forth, one to pour, and one to bear cups. And, of course, tasters for both the king and queen.

Gen wrinkled his nose at the procession, but Irene had long learned to appreciate the quiet artistry of three poached eggs balanced on a platter. She murmured her thanks to each of the servants as the breakfast was laid upon the table, then waved all but the tasters aside. 

"Gods forbid I spoon my own porridge," Gen remarked. 

Irene ignored his disgruntlement. "Indeed," she replied, deadpan. "Emissaries from the islands arrived at dawn."

"Urgent business?" Gen said. He claimed a quarter-melon, slices fanning across the platter, from his taster. "We'd best see them immediately."

"No." Irene shared a quick smile with her taster over a flaky pastry. "We deny their audience for the day."

"To what purpose?" Gen asked. "They've traveled through the night. We might extend them some courtesy."

Irene raised her chin, indicating the array of the table. 

"Proprieties, yet again," Gen groaned. "Did they forget to bring their silken slippers? Was their declaration of arrival punctuated improperly?"

"They will wait," Irene said, with a touch more formality.

Gen looked at her, at her taster, and his. "Of course, my queen." His gesture with the fork was as eloquent as a bow. He looked past her, sidelong, and she knew he suppressed a scowl.

*

The basest truth about Gen was that he had, for most of his life, been denied very little. Remarkably, he seldom acted entitled--the roles he took on in Eddis demanded much of him--but his training, his intelligence, his talent, and his charisma were a persuasive swarm the few could resist.

Few, that is, but Irene, when she chose. While she found herself growing to love her husband, it was often necessary to refuse his charm on the least and the most important things. He flourished a handful of violets in the middle of a council meeting, and she tucked the posy into her sash without granting him a smile. He requested trade concessions for Eddis--what he thought a simple exchange of goats--and she reeled off the implications of hereditary traits, as well as the result of last blight that had effected the royal herd. 

Sometimes, she thought, he found her refusals vexing, and kept vying for her approval. On better occasions, however, he fell quiet. He sat back and watched her, her fingers tapping against a scroll, as she sorted a barrage of requests into a cascade of actions. He watched her as she spoke to courtiers, to servants, to petitioners, as she called each by name and offered each a word.

Once, he caught her after a long afternoon of petitions. They were alone, aside guards at each corner of the chamber, so he touched her gently on the elbow. 

"Yes?" she asked. Her mind buzzed with accordances and timelines. 

Gen was silent long enough to capture her full attention. She stilled, and he smiled down at her. "You are quite awe-inspiring," he said, his voice a silken caress. His fingertips rubbed slow circles against her sleeve. 

"You are," she teased, "easily impressed."

He leaned close, and for a moment, she thought he would embrace her. She thought of the guards. "Eugenides," she whispered.

He stilled. His gaze darted past her, to the guards, and back to her. "Of course," he said. "Perhaps later?"

She didn't dare smile at him, but she hazarded a nod.

*

While they danced, so to speak, closer 'round each other, Gen did still push against what he saw as _Attolian_ customs, rather than habits unique to Irene herself. He tweaked the noses of her ministers and picked the pockets of her courtiers. He changed, most annoyingly, the arrangement of the archives.

Gen was especially affronted by the formalities of diplomacy, claiming that all the fripperies and finery simply delayed resolution. It was in these spaces that he came closest to arguing with her, sincerely, before the council and the court. He was most vehement regarding Eddis, but any incidence could provoke him.

All this to say that, when word came to Irene that Gen had held an audience with the island emissaries in the royal archives, she was disappointed, but not surprised.

*

As a maid prepared her gown for bed, and another brushed her hair, Irene watched Gen pace the confines of her dressing chamber. "A simple request to study our orchards," he said. "There was no reason to make them wait a day."

"There were many reasons," Irene replied. 

"Formalities," Gen responded. "Needless formalities."

Her braid finished and her robes gathered, Irene waved off her maids, with thanks. The guards shut the chamber door, and she settled into her chair. She stared at Gen long enough to make him shift on his feet.

"They just wanted to see the orchards," he protested again.

"Did you," she inquired, "admit them into the archives?"

"Yes."

"Did you," she inquired, "request extra guards?"

"No."

Irene laced her hands together. "When you rearranged the archives," she asked, "how accessible did you make the rosters?"

Gen frowned. "Those records are used the most often," he said. "But why--"

"Did you know," she continued, "the great-grandmother of one of the emissaries was a Mede noblewoman?"

Before Gen could answer, a knock sounded on the door. 

Irene rose. 

Gen stood frozen, and she watched his eyes as he played through implications and scenarios. In mere moments, his expression settled on shaken, and she called out, "Summon my maids back. We'll be needed in the throne room."

*

Gen found her on the rooftop, barefoot and wreathed in her robes. There were two guards at each point of the roof, and four standing just out of earshot around her.

She looked at him, over her shoulder. His shoulders were squared, and his lips pressed together. She offered him her right hand, and his fingers laced around hers. "If he had managed--"

"He didn't," she said. 

"I am an ass," Gen confessed.

Irene turned to face him, and dared to lean against his shoulder. "Trust," she said, and wasn't sure if it was a promise or a request.

His arms tightened around her. "Or did you mean, 'no, Eugenides, you are delightful'?"

Irene pulled back, just a breath, and laughed just as he bowed to kiss her.


End file.
